Allen West comes to town

Rep. Allen West was in town yesterday to appear as the featured speaker at the annual dinner of the Minnesota GOP Elephant Club. Out of the goodness of his heart, he also agreed to speak before the dinner to our small local chapter of the Republican Jewish Coalition. Chapter leader Mark Miller noted that we added a few new members who signed up to hear Rep. West, but Mark’s enthusiasm for Rep. West derived from his message.

In his remarks to our group Rep. West touched on ancient history extending back to Greece and Israel, the founding of the United States in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, the fiscal crisis, the current political scene including the damage being wrought to our armed forces by the president, the Arab Spring turned into an “Arab nightmare,” and, harking back to his religious education in the inner-city Atlanta neighborhood where Martin Luther King preached, his love of Israel (which he described as his “spiritual home”). We loved this guy.

The theme of Rep. West’s remarks was represented by a (disputed) quotation of Alexander the Great: “An army of sheep led by a lion is better than an army of lions led by a sheep.” Rep. West didn’t have to explain who he was talking about.

Rep. West discussed his own difficult race back home. He said that the Democrats weren’t happy about having a guy like him around to rally the opposition and that he was therefore a prominent target in the coming elections. His site is here. Please support him with your contributions here. We can’t afford to lose this lion.

Although his time with us was limited by his appearance at the GOP dinner, Rep. West stayed around to answer every question and pose for photos with everybody who wanted one. In the photo above, courtesy of Jim Knutson, Rep. West is pictured with our friend and Minnesota GOP Senate candidate Pete Hegseth, who was profiled this week by NRO’s Brian Bolduc here.